Another Word for Scarecrow
by Oceans in Hand
Summary: Iruka didn't have a prepared, well rehearsed and thoroughly thought out rant sitting in his head for this one. Honestly, 'unpredictable' had only recently joined the parade. KakaIru, 2shot.
1. Chapter 1

**Yay! I've been on a KakaIru kick : ) Does anyone know any really long, really good stories about these two? The only thing I've found so far is _Blind, _and I'm not a huge fan of angsty!Kakashi...(I still read it though).**

**Edited for the most part, too! And I know that the ending is kind of...uh, loose-thread-like, but I couldn't come up with anything better and some chibi in my head flashed a sign that said 'end it here!' **

**So blame the chibis. **

**Also, I don't know any teachers that (are dumb enough to) grade in pencil, but I didn't think pen worked either so...(locks up _accuracy _with _realism_).**

**Hope you like it! Please review!**

**-Oceans**

* * *

**Another Word for Scarecrow**

Weird.

That was Hatake Kakashi, summed up in a single word. But who said you had to stop there? There were plenty- strange, strong, enigmatic, unmotivated, easygoing...

Iruka could come up with a ton off the top of his head; enough, he was willing to bet, to fill a rather large book. The kind that hurt when it fell on your foot. And not all of them were complimentary.

...difficult, egotistic, intolerable...

Iruka stiffened. No...god, he didn't _need_ this now! He had tests to grade!

_Do your job, Umino!_ He growled lowly and bent over his work with renewed focus.

_Wrong, wrong, wr- right._

He smiled. "Good job, Ume-chan."

_"Talking to yourself, Umino-kun?"_

Iruka lurched and looked over his shoulder, but no one was there. The teasing rumble had come from his head. He shook it off and grabbed Yokiro-kun's test.

The next time it happened, he broke the tip of his pencil on the desk top.

"Damn it!" He snapped. Iruka took his head between his hands as it he was going to juice his brain out through his ears.

But of course he wasn't. Not his whole brain- just the odd Hatake-clouded memory...

He dropped his skull with a crack and sighed, defeated.

"...why did you have to do something so..._confusing_..." He whimpered, clenching his fist painfully tight.

Confusing. That was yet another word to add to his bo- list. It was probably a better one than 'weird'.

Unpredictable. There was another. Maybe it _wasn't_ so easy to describe the surviving Hatake with one term.

Kakashi was weird. He saw rules as only guidelines at best. Punctuality was something wadded up and forgotten in his back pocket. There wasn't room for _reasonable_ in a sentence that included the word _lie_ in his case. He single-handedly made reading porn in public acceptable in Konoha. But despite these faults, or perhaps _because_ of them, he was a genius. A true prodigy- and a mentally stable one. Always a bonus in the Hidden Leaf. He was an ideal comrade-in-arms and, though the term was applied loosely, dependable.

He was unpredictable. He just, well- was. Iruka didn't have a prepared, well rehearsed and thoroughly thought out rant sitting in his head for this one. Honestly, 'unpredictable' had only recently joined the parade. If someone had asked him two days ago if he thought the silver haired Jounin discernable, his answer would have been a hard, quick _yes_. But now...after what happened yesterday...

Maybe Kakashi wasn't quite as shallow as he seemed to be. Maybe he was ocean-deep. Maybe he was so shallow he reflected the sky. Iruka couldn't tell anymore, wasn't sure he wanted to know.

Confusing...jeez, same as 'unpredictable'. He hadn't thought up his speech yet. He hadn't realized there was a need for one.

Iruka clunked his head on the desk. Damn Kakashi, if he had just left him alone yesterday, he wouldn't be thinking so much _now_! If he hadn't...!

Iruka's cheeks caught fire. This was insane. He was a grown man! Not a blushing schoolgirl! It wasn't like he'd never been kissed before!

Some evil voice in his head decided to speak out.

_But not by a man._

_Not through cloth._

_And not like _that_._

He groaned. It had been difficult enough to go to sleep last night, when the incident...(_the cloth was rough- it scratched the soft skin just beneath his lip_)...had been fresh on his mind...(_wait a second, his back was against the terra cotta roof- when had that happened?!_)...but for it to _follow_ him, and hang around so strongly that thinking about it _still_ gave him butterflies...

Iruka's chin bounced off an ungraded test, startling him out of his revere. He looked mournfully down at the stack of unfinished work and sighed. Too much Kakashi on the brain. Not enough room for tests.

The children would have to wait to get their grades back.


	2. Chapter 2

**Ha! Here's the part to I told so many people I'd do...eventually...**

**This doesn't seem like it's finished to me, this chapter, but I'm too excited! I don't want to work on it anymore...-cry-**

**-Oceans**

**Edited? Hrm...No. XD**

* * *

The stack of paper was pinned down firmly by a roof tile- Iruka made damn sure of that. It wasn't often that he took his work to the rooftops, but often enough that he knew chasing thirty-odd homework assignments was absolutely no fun, and a waste of sunny afternoon.

He was on the seventh paper when that tickle started in the back of his neck. He stiffened, looking discretely for the source of the uncomfortable feeling, the person who was watching him, and huffed when he didn't find anything.

Why was he surprised? He was a mediocre ninja in a village full of better ones. He sighed, and slapped down a rebellious corner as the wind picked up, blasting a cocktail of Konoha smells, not all of them quite so pleasant into his face. He could pick out the row of garbage cans below, despite the firmly closed lids, and the smell of grease from scattered food stalls. But, when he opted to breathe in deep enough, he could detect the sweet scent of the trees, the floral spice in the air from well tended window boxes.

Iruka's eyelids drooped at half mast, and he sighed tiredly, looking down at his papers.

The tickle was back. The chuunin growled and stared fixedly at that paper in his lap.

If he couldn't pick out the prick with his _eyes, _then he'd try with his ears…

"Whacha doing?"

"Aaah! Hatake!" Iruka scrambled for a handhold as he slid dangerously close to the edge of the roof. "Damn you! Why did you do that?"

"Felt like it. You were a prime candidate for bothering. I finished my book, you see." He flashed the appallingly orange piece of literature at him, his mask stretched with what Iruka could only guess to be a grin.

He huffed, settling down on the tiles with confidence again. "Bother someone else. I'm busy."

"Did you know there's an equation for annoying people?"

Iruka rolled his eyes, determinedly ignoring him.

"First of all, you need to find someone who looks busy." The jonin began, taking a seat.

The other man groaned.

Kakashi seemed to find this reaction amusing. He leaned out and stared fixedly until Iruka grudgingly looked up.

"Entertain me for a minute. I'll be out of your hair soon enough." He smiled happily.

Iruka cocked a brow. _Why do I very seriously doubt those words? _He thought sarcastically. Outwardly he heaved a world-weary sigh and laid his pen on top of the assignment in his lap.

"Ask me, 'what next Kakashi?'"

_I hate you. _"What next?"

"You're not going to have teeth by the time you're an old man if you grind them like that you know. Next-" Iruka's death glare (copyright Uchiha Sasuke, but what he didn't know wouldn't hurt him) prompted him to continue. "You do something."

_You're so annoying. _"Do something?"

"Yes, something. Anything to leave this busy person thinking. The goal is to render them unable to refocus after you're gone."

_I can't believe I was ever convinced to give my students to you._ "So what do you do?"

"Oh…" Kakashi leaned back and looked away, over the rooftops and trees. "Well, different things. The same thing won't work on everyone, of course. But for example, you could do-"

"-this."

Iruka didn't see him move. Kakashi was elite even for a jonin, so that fact should not have taken him by surprise. It did though…Then he felt rough cloth of the other man's mask against his mouth, and through it the shape of his lips…

_W-…warm. _Iruka thought muzzily.

"Oops," Kakashi's spoke softly, making Iruka shiver. "I appear to have fallen on your lips."

And with that, he moved away and dropped from the roof.

* * *

**(Please tell me Kakashi is reasonably in character. I hate writing people like him or Sesshomaru, I'm always terrified I'll get them horribly wrong! -bites nails-)**


End file.
